Tour de Suisse: João Almeida fastest on uphill final to win stage 7 in Emmetten

João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) showed he is determined to fight for overall victory at the Tour de Suisse right to the very end of the race by going deep to win the mountain stage to Emmetten. However, his biggest rival, Kevin Vauquelin (Arkea-B&B Hotels), was also there and refused to surrender the leader's yellow jersey.

The French rider was the first to attack in the final kilometre. He could see the finish line ahead of him, but then Almeida came past him to win the stage and take the ten-second time bonus. Oscar Onley (Picnic-PostNL) also passed Vauquelin to take a six-second time bonus, with Vauquelin awarded four bonus seconds.

That left the Frenchman 33 seconds ahead of Almeida before Sunday's 10km uphill time trial. Almeida is a good time trialist, but so is Vauquelin, giving him an excellent chance of overall victory.

Julian Alaphilippe (Tudor Pro Cycling) suffered to finish fifth on the stage but is still third overall at 41 seconds.

Almeida wanted to win for the bonus seconds and to pay back his teammates.

"It was a hard day, fast all day. My teammates did a perfect job; they were super strong and pulled all day to catch the breakaway. This victory is for them. Every second is important, and we had to do our best," he said.

Almeida lost three minutes on stage 1 but has fought back every day. He will leave his all in the time trial in the hope of beating Vauquelin.

"I don't think I'm the favourite for overall victory, Kevin Vauquelin is also strong in the TT, so it's going to be tough. But I'm going to give everything I have," he said.

How it unfolded

The longest stage in this year's Tour de Suisse was always going to be crucial in the general classification battle, with Sunday's 10km uphill time trial to Stockhütte set to crown the final winner.

The European heatwave also hit central Switzerland, but that did not stop the early attacks. Sadly, before the break formed, the USA's Matthew Riccitello (Israel-Premier Tech) crashed hard, and he was later forced to abandon the Tour de Suisse. He was one of many to abandon during stage 7, with some riders seriously fatigued after also riding the Giro d'Italia or injured after a series of crashes.

Different-sized groups made different attempts to get away, but the peloton was never happy and so never let them go. The GC teams were especially vigilant, with UAE Team Emirates-XRG doing a lot of the chasing.

The elastic only snapped after a fast 60km of racing. Suddenly Quinn Simmons (Lidl-Trek), Aleksandr Vlasov (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), William Junior Lecerf (Soudal-QuickStep), Felix Engelhardt (Jayco-AlUla), Frank van den Broek (Picnic-PostNL), Hugo Houle (Israel-Premier Tech) and Tiesj Benoot (Visma-Lease a Bike) got away and got a gap.

With 110km to go, the gap was up to 3:30, but the peloton never let them go on the rolling terrain. Arkea-B&B Hotels and Tudor joined UAE Team Emirates-XRG at the front of the peloton, working for Vauquelin, Alaphilippe and Almeida, respectively.

Vlasov was first to the summit of the Schwändi climb as the peloton began to eat into their lead. Simmons won the first Tissot sprint, and Benoot won the second sprint, but the gap began to fall ominously. The views across Lake Zugersee were spectacular, but the racing was intense as the peloton reduced the gap to 2:00 with 70km to race.

With 40km to go, the gap was down to 1:15 as the two late climbs loomed on the horizon. The Bürgenstock began with 23km to go and climbed for 5.5km at an average of 7.8%.

The gap to the peloton was only 55 seconds, and so Simmons took off alone in search for a second breakaway victory. Behind, the peloton also blew apart after a Tudor acceleration, but Alaphilippe opted not to attack. However, the GC battle was suddenly on.

Felix Gall (Decathlon-AG2R La Mondiale) was keen to move up in the GC and surged up the climb. He was joined by João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates-XRG), Oscar Onley (Picnic-PostNL) and Kevin Vauquelin (Arkea-B&B Hotels) and a suffering Alaphilippe.

Simmons had a chance of success but was suddenly called back to the chase group to work for GC leader Lennard Kämna, who started the stage fifth overall.

Ahead of them, a sextet formed on the descent, with Van den Broek there to work for Onley, while Gall, Vauquelin, Almeida, and Alaphilippe took advantage of Picnic's excellent team tactics. The Kämna group kept the gap to 20 seconds thanks to a huge job by Simmons, who tried to match Van den Broek's work up front. There was so much to race for in the final 15km of the stage.

The final Emmetten climb to the finish line was short at 3.9km but also steep at 8.1% with an early part at 12.7%. Simmons emptied himself in pursuit of the attacks, and so the Kämna group started the climb with a gap of 25 seconds.

Gall was the first to attack on the climb with three kilometres to go, spinning away from his GC rivals. The other attackers forced Almeida to lead the chase with only Onley giving him a few turns on the front. They knew Gall was not a direct GC threat. Behind Ben O'Connor (Jayco-AlUla) tried to chase, to limit his losses and stay in the top six overall.

Almeida dragged the attackers up to Gall with a kilometre to go, and so the race for the stage victory and the bonus seconds began. Vauquelin attacked with ambition but was caught and passed by Almeida before the line.

Vauquelin can only hope for a different result and so overall victory after Sunday's 10km uphill time trial.

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